< Back to latest news & events

News

UK will no longer seek to participate in unitary patent and UPC

March 2020

The UK Government has confirmed the UK will no longer seek to be part of the proposed unitary patent (UP) or Unified Patent Court (UPC) systems. Given the UPC’s alignment with the CJEU, this is not entirely surprising for the UK in a post-Brexit world.

Although it will be unwelcome news for many, the certainty of this new stance may mean the UP and UPC can again pick up momentum, subject to the ongoing legal challenge in Germany and re-working of the agreements without the UK’s participation.

Should the UP and UPC agreements be ratified as per the current proposals, UK business will still be able to use the Unified Patent Court and unitary patent to protect their inventions within the contracting EU countries. However, in the UK, businesses will only have the option of protecting their inventions using national patents (including patents available from the non-EU European Patent Office) and UK courts.

UK business will still be open to litigation within the Unified Patent Court based on actions they undertake within the contracting EU countries if they infringe existing rights.

EU business will not be able to use the Unified Patent Court and unitary patent to protect their inventions within the UK but will be able to apply for domestic UK rights as they can now, via the UK Intellectual Property Office and the European Patent Office.

This update was prepared by HGF Partner Martyn Fish. If you would like further advice on this or any other matter, please contact Martyn.  Alternatively, you can contact your usual HGF representative or visit our Contact page to get in touch with your nearest HGF office.

Latest updates

Intellectual Property (IP) and its role in innovation during the energy transition

The shift from fossil fuels to greener energy will profoundly impact the profitability of many businesses in the energy sector. However, innovation has become an essential facilitator of the energy …

Read article

More than just ‘Patent Protected’: How Intellectual Property (IP) can fuel collaboration and growth

Traditionally, intellectual property (IP) protection is viewed as a mechanism to create a monopoly and exclude competitors. For example, patents give the owner the right to stop others from using …

Read article

HGF continues to grow with 7 new promotions

It gives us great pleasure to announce that seven members of our team have been promoted from Director to Partner. These promotions will be effective from the 1st of May …

Read article

Happy World IP Day!

This year’s theme is ‘IP and the SDGs: Building our common future with innovation and creativity’. At HGF we are committed to supporting our clients in sustainable technologies and routinely …

Read article

IP Ingredients, Part 12: Exploring colours in the food & drink sector – overcoming hurdles and leveraging colour trade marks

We will all recognise as consumers an instance of when we used the colour of a product or its packaging to identify a specific brand that we wanted to buy …

Read article

Medical 3D Technologies: From Scanning to Printing

When we think of 3D technologies, we often think of 3D printing, which, as discussed later, has seen rapid advances in recent years. However, a sometimes overlooked area of medical …

Read article